Overwatch Esports Glossary
Aether United hopes to expand into many different esports scenes as we continue to grow. It is important for us to know how each game conducts their professional scene. Therefore, while I research about other games. I have decided to make a glossary list of some esports/gaming terms to help clear things up. This article will include everything relating to Overwatch esports:
General Information:
OW: Overwatch ~ A fairly new esports game created in May of 2016. It’s gotten lots of attention and is quickly becoming a competitor with the top esports.
FPS: First Person Shooter ~ A genre in video gaming that revolves around a gun or other weapon in a first-person perspective. Other popular examples of this genre are Call of Duty (CoD) and Halo.
Blizzard: The creator of Overwatch. Also created games such as World of Warcraft (WoW), Hearthstone, and Diablo.
Servers: Overwatch’s servers are based off of the ones that Blizzard has established throughout their other games so it’s hard to find which of Blizzard’s servers are made for Overwatch. Some of their servers are located in Los Angeles, Chicago, Sydney, Singapore and São Paulo.
Competitive Scene:
Competition Terms: During competitions, there are lots of Blizzard employees that perform tasks specific to Overwatch tournaments.
Shoutcaster: A shoutcaster is very similar to a sports commentator. Their job is to describe what is happening for each game of Overwatch that is played.
Analyst Desk: A group of four analysts who discuss possible strategies, team compositions, and predictions before a game starts. They also compare previous games and activities that each team has gone through to provide a thorough prediction for how each game could play out. After each game, they also provide thorough analysis and rewatch specific sections of the game to explain possible thought processes going through each players mind.
Other phrases used to reference stuff related to competitions.
Swag: Any merchandise that is sold at tournaments. It could be sold by Riot itself or by the participating teams. Examples include sweatshirts, plushies, hats, etc
BlizzCon: A convention specifically made for Blizzard made games. The World Cup for Overwatch is held at BlizzCon in Anaheim, CA every year.
Competitions and Match Types: Each tournament is separated into different match types depending on the severity and position of each team playing.
Top 32 Showdown: The top 32 countries get put into groups of four labeled from (A — H). The groups closes to each other in letter (A — B, C — D, etc) play each other in Round-Robin fashion. The winners face each other in single-elimination playoffs.
Overwatch World Cup: The victors of the Top 32 Showdown will face off with each other at the Overwatch World Cup in BlizzCon. The champions of BlizzCon carries home the prize money and the title of the World Cup Champions of Overwatch.
There are other competitions as well. But these are not hosted by Blizzard so they will not be listed here. You can find these by searching “Overwatch competitions”.
Round-Robin: Contrary to an elimination competition, each competitor plays against each opponent in turn (ie if there were 4 teams A, B, C, and D: A will play B, C, and D — B will play A, C, and D — etc).
Single-Elimination: A single game where the winner will continue to the next round of competitions.
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